New NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement Ratified For 4 Years Starting 2026-27

More than a year before the expiry of its current deal, a new NHL collective bargaining agreement has been locked in.

On Tuesday, the league and the NHL Players’ Association announced that the new four-year deal which was announced at the draft on June 27 has officially been ratified.

“The partnership between the players’ association and the league is stronger than it ever has been and working together under this agreement presents a fantastic opportunity to continue to grow the game,” said NHL commissioner Gary Bettman. “We are grateful to the board of governors for its support of this agreement that strengthens our game and ensures we are collectively delivering a great fan experience in the years to come.”

For now, the official details are relatively scant. During the press conference at the draft, both Bettman and NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh declined to offer specifics on the changes in the new agreement. Tuesday’s press release states that the new memorandum of understanding will be made publicly available at a later date.

At this point, the main takeaway is that a league that has a long history of acrimonious labor relations with its players is in a more cooperative place — something Bettman has been trumpeting ever since Walsh took the reins at the players’ association just over two years ago.

And it’s true: the league is in a good place. Revenues for the just-completed 2024-25 season are projected to hit a record $6.6 billion, and that money is flowing through to players based on the established 50/50 split of hockey-related revenue in the form of massive salary-cap increases over the next three seasons. With the financial framework put in place in January to see the cap ceiling rise from $88 million in 2024-25 to $113.5 million in 2027-28, the monetary aspect of the new CBA was handled even before the two sides officially sat down at the bargaining table in late March.

Under Walsh’s leadership, the two sides also finally brought back best-on-best international play — which has long been a priority for the players. February’s 4 Nations Face-Off turned out to be a home run in its own right, far surpassing initial expectations that it would serve as an enticing teaser for the 2026 Winter Olympics.

“This CBA shows what can be accomplished when the NHL and the union work together – an agreement that will allow for the continued worldwide growth of the game. That is a win for everyone,” said Walsh. “We could not have achieved this outcome without the involvement and support of our players. Special thanks to our executive board and negotiating committee.”

Over the years, the NHL’s labor history included a brief strike by players in April of 1992, followed by a half-season lockout which trimmed the 1994-95 season to 48 games. In 2004-05, the entire season was lost as the owners successfully pushed for a hard salary-cap structure that initially saw players receive 57 percent of hockey-related revenue. After another lockout that cut the 2012-13 season to 48 games, that share was trimmed to the 50 percent that stands today.

That 2013 CBA, which ran for eight years, still forms the foundation of the league’s labor agreement. Its 10-year term was initially set to expire after the 2021-22 season, but the extraordinary conditions of the pandemic forced the two sides to a virtual bargaining table in the summer of 2020, creating a return-to-play plan as part of a memorandum of understanding that extended the CBA to the end of the 2025-26 season and would allow the league to successfully weather that complex financial storm.

The new deal is expected to take a similar form, making tweaks rather than wholesale changes. And while none of those changes has yet been officially confirmed, reports from the draft suggest that these will be some key adjustments:

• Regular-season schedule is increased from 82 to 84 games, while pre-season schedule is reduced.
• Maximum contract lengths will be reduced by one year, to seven years for players who re-sign with their own teams and six years for players signing with new teams.
• A mechanism will be introduced to address salary-cap compliance in the playoffs, but details on that mechanism are not yet clear.
• Teams will be able to keep a permanent emergency backup goalie for both home and road games, eliminating the need for amateur ‘EBUGs’ who have occasionally been pressed into service in games where both regular goalies become injured.
• Dress codes and fitness testing will be eliminated.

These changes will take effect for the 2026-27 season, but the issue of standardized draft rights has become more pressing. In the past, teams held the rights to players drafted out of the Canadian Hockey League for two years but could retain the rights to players from the NCAA and Europe for four years. With the changes to the NCAA rules that now allow CHL players including future stars like Gavin McKenna to play college hockey, there’s a need to standardize draft rights across the leagues as the lines between the development paths have blurred. It’s believed that the new system will allow teams to keep all players’ rights until they’re 22 years old, no matter where they’re drafted from.

Other details may still emerge when the new NHL collective bargaining agreement is eventually made public. Right now, teams and agents can continue their off-season business with the knowledge that the league is thriving and no work stoppage lies ahead until at least the end of the 2029-30 season.